A Love Less Complicated: Between Chapter 5 & 6
by NathanJB96
Summary: Through out this book there are some time between chapters of the book that aren't fully explained of what happens. This just happens to be one of those incidents between chapter 5 and 6.


A Love Less Complicated: Between Chapter 5 & 6

As I stepped out onto Gatsby's porch, I could hear the rain patting the cement; hard yet subtle at the same time. There I took a moment to reflect on the relationship of Gatsby and Daisy. A deprived war hero and a girl stuck in the midst of the terrors of loves crippling grip. At first I noticed that this was a recipe for destruction but at that moment everything seemed right and just, so I left it be. When thinking about their connection, it left me a sort of emptiness in my own heart. A feeling of almost jealousy, I wanted to have someone that would love me unconditionally. Yet the only person even closest to that description was Jordan Baker.

I stepped down the steps from Gatsby's porch and started my journey home; it was a peculiar feeling when my feet adjusted from the cold hard cement, to the green wet grass and brown mushy mud. When walking through the lawns returning to my house I couldn't help but feel this feeling of exhaustion, I could finally relax into my own home. I entered into my house weak and _languid_, my body aching for sleep. As soon as I took off my black shoes dripping from rain and brown mud, the telephone rang. Still struggling to get my shoes off I ran for the phone in the other room.

"Hell- hello?" I said groggy and disoriented,

"Mr. Carraway, I hope you weren't sleeping on this fine evening…" It was Jordan; she had a very upbeat and sensual sort of tone in her voice. I hesitated as if I was trying to impress her and straightened out my voice and cleared it

"Oh no, no ma'am." She gave a childish giggle as if she were one with a secret to tell.

"Well then Mr. Carraway, why don't we spend some time together?" I didn't quite know what to think of the situation. I mean Jordan had a very sweet and delicate side to her, but what lay beneath that I knew was too much for me to handle.

"Well Jordan…. I don't know I just came back from Gatsby's home and I am very exhausted."

"Oh come on Nick, why don't you come over tomorrow morning and we can take a stroll through the park."

"Well Jordan I-" I studdered.

"Be here at noon and we will be on our way, Goodbye Mr. Carraway." Jordan had hung up the phone so fast and eagerly it was like she almost knew I was thinking about her.

I slowly put the phone back onto the receiver and noticed my hand was shaking. I didn't know if that was because I missed dinner and lunch or the thought of meeting Ms. Baker tomorrow afternoon. I tried to _elude_ the idea of meeting Ms. Baker tomorrow so I could finally sleep in my own bed tonight with a feeling of _complacency_. From that point on, my mind went to imaginary _ether_ where I could finally relax. Yet that didn't quite happen. Every thought that entered my mind, even the most _vacuous_ dreams, Jordan Baker was there; seeing her _florid _face with that mischievous smile always grabbed my attention. It was a fake reality that ceaselessly went on that I couldn't quite escape the grasp of. My alarm clock woke me in a scare at 9:30, my body jumped straight up in my bed and I quickly hit the alarm clock. The alarm clock being almost broken _asunder,_ I _receded_ back into my bed. I rubbed my sore eyes and stood up, my stomach was growling because I had a lack of appetite for the past few days.

I left my bedroom and went into my bathroom so I could clean myself up, I looked in the mirror and noticed my _wan_ face; I looked like a mess. I opened up the mirror to my medicine cabinet and grabbed shaving cream and a razor. I took a brush and smeared the shaving cream on, as I brushed around my face I kept on thinking about the time that my father first showed me how to shave. My father told me it was one of the many trials to becoming a "man". I had finished my shave and ran the razor in hot water and splashed some on my face, cleaning off the excess cream. With one last feel, I felt my face to check for any missed hairs and felt nothing but smooth skin. My face had regained a bit of its color from the hot water when I rubbed my face. After changing into my Sunday best clothing I went down stairs into the kitchen and decided to cook myself an omelet. I grabbed two eggs out of the refrigerator and took out a frying pan and a bowl. Cracking the two eggs on the side of the bowl and dumping them in, I grabbed a fork and started stirring the eggs together forming a gelatinous texture in the bowl. I dumped the eggs into the pan and saw the whites of the eggs go from a clear to white and yellow color almost instantly, hearing a long sizzle as I dumped them. It seemed like a great start to a great day. But as I took my fork and cut the side of the omelet, I was sadly mistaken.

The phone rang again, so I put my fork down and ran to the phone and picked it up more calmly this time and happier.

"Hello this is Mr. Carraway?"

"Nick where are you? I need you here now!" Jordan had a very worried and stressed tone this time around. It made me sort of nervous and choked me up.

"I'll be right there Jordan." I shoved all the food I could in my mouth and put the plate and pan into the sink and took my keys and ran into my car. My car had started off a bit rough, shooting smoke out of the muffler with a strong tinge of gas but I was soon off. I had arrived at Jordan's house and knocked on the door. She arrived at the door and swung it open inviting me in very quickly.

"Come in Nick…"

"What's the issue Jordan?" She kept on pacing back and forth and seemed deep into her thoughts.

"Call me crazy but I have this notion…"

"Well Ms. Baker what is it?"

"I don't think Gatsby is who he says he is." This so called "notion" annoyed me greatly. Nobody can accept Gatsby for who he was, there was no getting around him without a catch being involved of him being a murderer or a spy.

"Jordan, I highly doubt Gatsby is lying about his life. I mean what does he have to hide?" Jordan stopped and looked at me brightly.

"Exactly… What is he hiding under that thick head of his that he doesn't want us to know?"

"Jordan this is ridiculous, there's no need to start heading into his personal life just because he doesn't want to tell us something." She had a very confused and frustrated look on her face, like I was supposed to support her idea and help her confrontation.

"Don't you want to really know what's going on in his life? The only reason I'm curious is to protect Daisy. I thought you would understand Nick." To know the truth about Gatsby and to end the rumors was very tempting, but this was her trying to manipulate me with her charm and charisma. I couldn't give in.

"Jordan it's not right to barge into Gatsby's life and try to figure out his past. He's not mentioned it for a reason."

"So you know about Gatsby?" She caught me off guard and I hesitated to respond.

"Well no, but frankly I don't want to find out. It's Gatsby's business and his business only." I was annoyed with Jordan at this point she meant nothing to me, "and maybe if you talked to Gatsby and understood him, he wouldn't seem like such a bad person."

I immediately took my coat and left out the door, Jordan tried to call after me with her voice that gets trapped in the corners of my head, but I ignored her. I saw something in her that wasn't quite right, and in all honesty she seemed a bit worse than Gatsby's unknown past. She was getting on my nerves, I know I wanted love, but this isn't even love. It's something much worse, a manipulation. I was being used to bleed information about Gatsby's life; I was just a pawn in Jordan's gossip game. As I came home, I thought on the ride home what I had said and I pondered if I should tell Gatsby about this incident. But Jay seemed to be at a peaking point in his life; He had his girl, his money, his house, and his boats and cars. I wouldn't want to do anything to ruin that for him. So I kept this incident to myself. The steps to my house still had a little bit of rain from the previous night, the orange-ish brown marble mixed with a shiny gloss from the water gave it an interesting color; and the comforting smell of the rain calmed me a bit. But as I walked up I noticed something different, I saw foot prints on my porch...

After comparing the muddy foot prints to mine they were about two sizes too big. It couldn't have been me from last night. I sprinted up to my door taking strides up the stairs, my foot landing every third step. My door had a muddy foot print on it too, the same pattern as the other print. It was half open and I immediately opened the door all the way, but it had fallen off its hinges echoing through out my home, leaving a sound of hopelessness bouncing off the walls. My house was destroyed. Cabinets broken, papers everywhere, I was absolutely mortified by the scene. I immediately went for the phone, but the table it was sitting on was shattered; fortunately the phone was still working. My hands were shaking with anger trying to dial in numbers, I had so many questions and not enough answers.

"Hello, officer? My name is Nick Carraway." Taking long breaths "I'm reporting a break in, my address is…." The line was cut. I hit the receiver what felt like a hundred times and I threw my phone down the hall. Then it hit me. Someone was in the house at that moment. I made my way to the kitchen and looked for the nearest make shift weapon to protect myself. I didn't own a gun, what use would I have for it? So I improvised and picked up the frying pan I used earlier that morning. I picked it up with both hands, holding it like a baseball bat. I walked through out the house, slowly and quietly checking every corner of the house. Walking up the stairs I noticed on the floor my invitation from Gatsby. Were they looking for Gatsby? Slowly opening the door to my bedroom I felt the sense of someone being in there. I put myself in the mind set of a criminal and thought about where I would hide. My first instinct was under the bed, I slowly stepped towards my bed hearing the creek of floor boards under my feet giving myself away that I was here. A man quickly reached out under the bed and grabbed my ankles pulling me out from under myself. I reacted almost instinctively and when he was crawling out I pulled myself out of his grasp and grabbed my pan and swung it in a full 180 degrees bashing him in the head with the sound of an echoing ting from the pan afterwards. He was knocked unconscious, his head had a gash in it with a bloody cut. I immediately scooted back to the wall until my back hit it and I laid my head back against the wall.

"What's even happening to my life right now?" I ran my hands through my hair and felt a cool sweat on my forehead. A few cars had pulled in front of my house, it was the police. They had taken the man in hand cuffs and asked a few questions regarding my house condition, but in all fairness they didn't even seem like they cared about the whole situation. They then told me they didn't have enough money to do any of the repairs because of the poor economy conditions. Then Gatsby pulled up in his car, and half jogged his way through the doorway.

"What the hell happened Nick?"

"Well what does it look like? A man tried to come into my house looking for answers about you…." A sense of sarcasm lay within those few sentences I huffed out.

"Me?! How does this have to do anything with me?"

"Well Jay, he ran through all my papers and tried to keep any papers with your name on them. My whole room is destroyed and all my business papers are sprawled out across my entire house!" I took a few deep breaths. I didn't know if I was over exaggerating the situation or not.

"Hey old sport…" he took one hand out of his pocket and scratched his head "Listen I'll pay for a hotel room for you to sleep tonight and I'll get my guys over here immediately to start repairing this…" He struggled to find the word. "This mess." Yeah… That's what it was… one big hot mess. After a few moments of thought I finally came to my decision.

"Okay… Alright Jay."

"And hey old sport."

"Yeah Jay?"

"Why don't you stop by tomorrow morning and we can have breakfast, I have some things I want to discuss with you." To me this seemed like just another beginning to a new terrible treachery.

"Alright Jay…." Those were the few words I would regret ever saying….


End file.
